


The Annual 'Might as Well Just Bash Your Head Repeatedly Against a Stone Wall Because It's More Likely to Give an Inch' Talks

by Just_Another_Day



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Auguste Isn't Helping, Auguste Lives, Damen Is Clueless, Fluff, Getting Together, Growing Up Together, Humor, Jealousy, Laurent Knows Everything, M/M, Mood Swings, childhood crush
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-08
Updated: 2016-12-08
Packaged: 2018-09-07 07:40:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,331
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8789377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Just_Another_Day/pseuds/Just_Another_Day
Summary: It took Damen twelve years to realise just how lucky he was. Laurent, of course, had a pretty good idea where this whole thing was heading from day one.





	

**Author's Note:**

> When I first finished reading the trilogy and was still in a darker headspace, my brain couldn't initially process even the passing idea of writing humour in this fandom. Well challenge accepted, brain. On a continuum, this leans more towards crack than canon. However, there are some serious moments. In particular, please be warned that this includes a Laurent who's barely hit adolescence pining over and flirting with five-years-older Damen, but rest assured Damen's having none of it and nothing actually happens until Laurent's 18. If that situation is still likely to trigger you, though, please look after yourself.

0.

Damen was staring into space, too busy being bored to tears to actually pay attention to what Damen's father had once privately referred to as their annual might-as-well-just-bash-your-head-repeatedly-against-a-stone-wall-because-it's-more-likely-to-give-an-inch talks, otherwise known as treaty discussions between Akielos and Vere.

So it was that all Damen initially saw was a unfocused blur of yellow before he was literally yanked out of his daydreaming by a sharp downwards tug to his hand. Then, even more unexpectedly, he suddenly had a set of wet lips pressed to his cheek.

After a long moment in which he wondered how on earth he was supposed to respond to this particular kind of non-violent stealth attack, Damen received an equally unceremonious kick to the shin, as if to even things out.

"What?" Damen said, stunned, when he really meant 'ow'.

Damen's first ever clear view of Prince Laurent of Vere featured the boy toddling back without a care in the world to his older brother, who didn't stop laughing at Damen's expense for several minutes straight. Despite this, it was hard to direct any substantive amount of annoyance towards Auguste, who had long since proven himself even more willing to laugh at himself than at Damen.

Damen told himself it should be even more difficult to carry a grudge against a boy almost half his age, but Damen couldn't help but think that the boy's smile whenever he glanced back up from his book appeared decidedly less good-natured than his brother's. Damen glared at the boy. He got a deceptively angelic look in return.

Well, if disliking a six-year-old boy was foolish, then apparently something about Prince Laurent of Vere inspired Damen to give in to stupidity.

 

1.

Why was _he_ here, Damen wondered the next year when he saw Laurent sitting at the table, barely able to see over the high edge of the thick wood, and certainly even less able to actually contribute anything to an important summit between rival nations. He was younger than Damen had been when he was first allowed to ( _forced_ to) attend these meetings, and honestly, he wasn't even the Crown Prince of his kingdom anyway. At least Damen and Auguste had a more pressing reason to be involved in and try to learn from their countries' regular (failed) attempts at diplomacy.

As if he could read Damen's thoughts, Laurent stuck his nose up a little higher over the table and scowled across at him. Damen was glad the table was so wide and Laurent's legs were still so comparatively short. At least this year Damen might not end up carrying a surprisingly painful bruise to the shin around with him for several days after the Veretian party inevitably departed in a huff.

"Leave the boy alone," Damen's father said when he caught Damen making a face at Laurent. "You're far too old to be picking fights with a boy barely grown enough to hold up even a half-length wooden practice sword."

Ha. As if Damen were the one who had started this bizarre little rivalry.

"You're a moronic brute, and I hate you," Laurent stated primly before he was placed on a pony and led away by a servant, not even giving Damen time to suggest that the feeling might be mutual.

Auguste teased, "At least this time he actually spoke to you." 

Damen would just as soon have been completely ignored, thanks.

 

2.

Damen was once again too busy daydreaming, this time about the new slave his father had assigned to him, to really focus on the meeting. But who could blame him? She was a few years older than him, and her breasts and hips had blossomed to an extent that most of the girls his own age still hadn't quite achieved. Not to mention how her scant clothes got all wet and transparent as she bathed him.

Damen caught a flash of golden hair and thought for a moment that it was just part of his imaginings; a visual of how her hair bounced temptingly around her (unusually for Ios) pale face.

It was not the memory of the slave girl that had caught his attention just then, though. It was the actual presence of the younger Veretian prince. Damen abruptly realised they were alone at the table, suggesting the other 'diplomats' had probably retreated to seek much-needed alcohol and regather what little remained of their frayed tempers. 

Damen, faced with Prince Laurent of Vere, braced himself to be either struck or insulted, or both.

"Auguste says you fight well, for a savage." 

Damen was one hundred percent certain that last part was actually Laurent's embellishment, not Auguste's.

"So prove it," Laurent challenged.

"Excuse me?" 

"Show me how to fight," Laurent commanded.

It was on the tip of his tongue to tell the little monster to get lost, but then Damen found himself shrugging his agreement. Honestly, what else did he have to do today while the talks were suspended? And anyway, he couldn't deny he had some excess energy he could probably stand to burn off as a result of those daydreams.

"Auguste won't fight me properly," Laurent complained when they reached the practice ring. "He always lets me win. You won't do that, will you?"

As explanations for inexplicable demands to fight someone went, Damen supposed it wasn't the worst he'd ever heard. It surprisingly also happened to be something with which Damen could empathise.

"Kastor used to always do the same to me," he said, a peace offering between them. They were technically here for peace negotiations, after all.

Laurent picked up a wooden practice sword, and although it was full length rather than a half sword, Damen made a note that his father hadn't been too far wrong about Laurent being too young to easily keep it extended.

"Swordsmanship is going to be primarily about footwork and quick wrists for someone small like you," Damen instructed when Laurent kept trying to broadly swing the sword at him with all his limited might, nearly toppling over from the effort. "You've not got the muscle to rely on strength."

Laurent huffed, "I'm not weak!" 

"No, but you are still growing. And even then, you'll never exactly be built like a mountain, will you?"

Laurent angrily poked Damen in the belly with the tip of the sword, hard.

Instead of being irritated, as Laurent might have expected, Damen laughed and said, "There, exactly like that! You need to get in under your opponent's guard and just slide it in, not windmill the sword wildly around on the off chance you'll happen to hit something. If you play it right, being small means that they probably won't see you coming. And you're faster than a larger man as well. Your size is an advantage, in a lot of ways."

Laurent appeared to have never been told this key information before. Damen would dismiss his instructor, assuming he had one, except said instructor was probably in Vere right now, and Damen had no authority to determine the Prince of Vere's tutors.

It occurred to Damen then that his father would probably have some choice words if he were aware of Damen helping a Veretian – a potential opponent – learn skills that might one day be used to cut down Damen and his countrymen. Peace talks or no, describing relations with Vere as tense would be something of an understatement. As princes of their realms, Damen and Laurent were more likely than not to meet one day on the field of battle.

Damen took in scrawny little Laurent. Yeah, he wasn't overly worried.

He raised his sword and beckoned for Laurent to attack.

 

3\. 

Laurent seemed to be in a horrific mood almost the whole way throughout the talks the next year.

"You're really too stupid to live. I'm seriously considering putting you out of your misery when I'm old enough," he decreed to Damen as soon as the first break was announced. "Come fight me."

Well that seemed like an alarmingly bad idea.

Perhaps, after all, Damen really should have thought a little harder before agreeing to train an heir to a foreign throne on how to wield a sword.

Still, he took Laurent through a few drills regardless of any misgivings, despite how his imperious demands should have put Damen off, and even though their sparring was accompanied by a near-murderous expression. 

Something about Laurent just made it strangely difficult to say no, even for the sake of self-preservation.

 

4\. 

Boredom. That was what had led to what Damen believed must be the most idiotic idea ever concocted between an Akielon and a Veretian. That was saying something, he thought, given how badly these negotiations always seemed to go. The agreement to return to the negotiations every year probably should have itself been long since declared the worst idea ever. But no. This here today might actually top that.

"You never know. It could be good. We might as well give it a try and see," Auguste had said, not sounding particularly enthusiastic.

But like Damen said: boredom. The practice rings were closed this year, and there was no time for riding or hunting, so what else were they supposed to do?

So there they were, practically circling each other, each sizing the other up.

"Come on," Damen finally said when neither of them displayed a willingness to draw any closer to the other. "It's not like we both haven't done this before."

"Not with each other," Auguste countered. Then he shrugged, stepped forward, and smacked his lips against Damen's for less than a second before stepping back, making certain to allow absolutely no contact between any other parts of their bodies at any stage throughout.

"Tell me that's not how you kiss your Veretian girls back home," Damen said, snickering.

"I don't kiss Veretian girls," Auguste pointed out. "Haven't you paid any attention to our customs?"

"Some," Damen said. "Which means I know you should be better-versed with kissing _boys_ than I am."

"But it's _you_ ," Auguste pointed out.

"Hey, you're the one who wanted to."

"Forget it," Auguste said. "It's too weird."

"Oh no. Now you've no choice. Your reputation is on the line, because that was a truly horrible attempt. That actually somehow managed to be worse than the time your tiny little brother kissed me and then kicked me for absolutely no reason. The prowess of all Veretians is in question."

Auguste, not one to shirk such a challenge, visibly braced himself.

At least the following kiss was not another enactment of a recalcitrant toddler kissing some distant and barely-tolerated relative. From a purely technical perspective, it actually wasn't half bad.

But Damen and Auguste both mutually took a step away from each other and made faces.

"Nope," Damen said definitively. Auguste, for his part, looked like he desperate to scrub his lips against his sleeve as if that would erase the kiss from having ever existed.

With his pale hair, paler skin, and years' worth of proof that they got along well together, Auguste should really have been just Damen's type. There was, however, some spark that was completely missing, and Damen couldn't completely write it off as a lack of female curves. That had never stopped him before, after all.

Auguste suddenly swore with gusto.

"What," Damen said, amused, "don't tell me you're disappointed. You can't have really been hoping that would be any good, surely?"

"No." Auguste sounded mournful now. "I just saw Laurent running off like there was some kind of monster at his heels. What's the bet he was sneaking around and saw us, and is even now telling our fathers about it in excruciating detail?"

Damen groaned and told himself that he should have (and had, in fact) known better. The next time he got bored at one of these things he should just break out the alcohol to numb the monotony like Kastor always did.

He'd probably even have been better off once again spending the downtime training Laurent to kill him.

Next year he'd make sure the damned training rings were free.

 

5\. 

Laurent appeared directly in front of Damen without any warning. He was surprisingly stealthy for an eleven-year-old boy, Damen decided.

The look he levelled at Damen made him feel like he'd just been weighed and might soon be found wanting.

"You should stay away from Auguste," Laurent warned.

Damen blinked in surprise. That wasn't quite what he had been expecting.

"And I thought Auguste was the one intent on playing the role of protective brother," Damen replied. "You needn't worry about Auguste's virtue. Neither of us enjoyed kissing each other even a little bit. No chance of that happening again."

Laurent looked close to ecstatic about that, which Damen thought was a little bit insulting. Would it really have been so bad for Damen to have been involved with Laurent's brother? He hadn't thought Laurent actually hated him anymore, at least not enough that he couldn't stand his presence. Why, it had been two whole years since the boy had threatened to kill him. Wasn't that progress?

Maybe he _was_ still plotting against Damen, though, because Laurent proceeded to follow Damen around the rest of the day. Apparently he did so for some purpose that didn't require engaging directly with him, for Laurent didn't speak another word to Damen the whole time.

When he tried to ask Auguste why Laurent was acting weird(-er than normal), Auguste, without turning to face him, said out of the corner of his mouth, "Well, he's had a lifetime of practice with liking me. He's never had to figure out how to handle liking anyone else."

"What?"

"Sorry, I'd better go. I've been told I'm not to as much as look at you, under pain of death."

Wow, Damen thought. He hadn't realised King Aleron would take that stupid kiss so seriously. 

But it was Laurent, not his father, at whom Auguste looked pointedly just after he made that odd declaration. Laurent was glaring suspiciously at the way the pair of them stood within scant feet of each other.

Ah, Damen thought. So apparently Laurent had merely redirected that homicidal streak of his. 

That was all right, he supposed. Better Auguste than him. At least Auguste could be assured that Laurent liked him far too much to ever _seriously_ threaten his well-being.

Unlike Damen. Because Auguste was clearly delusional on that point. There was no way that Laurent felt anything for Damen other than a grudging willingness to put up with him for long enough to get whatever it was he wanted from him.

If only Damen could just figure out _what_ Laurent wanted. Veretians were confusing.

 

6\. 

"And here he is," Auguste announced loudly. "Damen, Laurent has not been able to shut up about you all the way here."

Since Laurent currently looked so mortified that he might never be willing to speak again, Damen was somewhat sceptical of this claim. 

Laurent pointedly buried his face in a book and actively avoided Damen the whole day after that, no matter how much Auguste nudged at him like a horribly smug older brother (Damen knew all about those, sadly). So Damen never did get to find out whether it was true that Laurent hadn't been able to stop talking about him, or why.

He didn't really know why he cared.

 

7\. 

The next year, Vere and Akielos collectively staged a tournament at the conclusion of the talks. Damen took this to mean that the relationship between their countries must be improving, even if their inability to actually put any lasting and fair agreement into writing never seemed to alter. That, or everyone was just so frustrated with the lack of political progress by this point that they wanted any legitimate excuse to physically take it out on each other. Come to think of it, that did seem more likely.

Even so, Damen wasn't about to complain about a chance to actually _do_ something. The talks had been even more monotonously useless than he remembered, and Damen hadn't even been able to escape from them long enough to have a training session with Laurent this year. As a result, his body was desperate for a proper workout.

As Damen stripped down and oiled up for his wrestling match, he happened to spy Laurent closely watching him. Nearly salivating over the sight of him, in fact, his eyes lingering in a fashion so obvious that even Damen couldn't miss the implications.

_Oh_. Well then.

In retrospect, that might actually have explained a thing or two.

The boy practically skipped towards him after Damen's victory, his eyes arrestingly bright and his smile a youthful approximation of flirtation.

"Forget the swordplay. This time you need to teach me how to wrestle," Laurent demanded.

That sounded like just about the worst idea Damen had ever heard, given the circumstances. Worse even than kissing Auguste. Inexplicably, though, what came out of his mouth was not 'no way in hell', but rather the words, "What you really need to be taught is how to say 'please'."

Laurent raised an eyebrow and pointedly did not say please. All the same, Damen soon somehow found himself whisked away from the cheering crowds and pulled inside the relative privacy of the training ring. 

"You're forgetting something," said Laurent as Damen instructed Laurent to come at him.

"I don't think I am."

Laurent's smile was sly. "I've been given to understand that there are certain traditions in Akielos when it comes to wrestling attire."

Damen snorted. "When you can prove you're skilled enough –" (old enough, he mentally amended) "– that I think there's any chance you'll be able to actually use a handhold on my clothes against me, then I'll shed them. For now, I'm not worried."

Laurent's obvious disappointment at Damen choosing not to get naked was about as discomforting as how visibly pleased Laurent appeared whenever Damen got up close into his space to demonstrate a move or, ultimately, to pin Laurent on his back at the end of their scuffles.

"Yield," Damen ordered.

Laurent, instead of struggling, relaxed into his hold. "Why would I do that when I've got you right where I want you?"

Damen dropped his grip abruptly and practically leaped back to a safe distance.

"Laurent," Damen said.

It must have been obvious from his gently censuring tone what he was going to say, for Laurent immediately made an annoyed face and pushed himself back up to his feet, his stance less playful and more geared for a fight than it had ever been while they were actively wrestling.

"You're going to tell me I don't know my own mind," Laurent complained.

"I wouldn't dare even think such a thing. But I know my own mind as well."

Laurent grimaced. "You don't like me." It wasn't a question.

"I like you fine," Damen corrected, a little surprised to acknowledge that as the truth. "But I'm not physically attracted to anyone whose voice hasn't even had a chance to break yet. You should look for someone your own age."

"I'm not a child!"

"You are to me," Damen countered with finality, even knowing how those words would likely wound someone as strong-willed and precocious as Laurent.

Sure enough, Laurent whispered bitterly, "I hate you."

Damen sighed. "I wish you wouldn't, but that's your right."

Laurent looked like he wanted to strike him. "Why do you always have to be so reasonable about everything?"

Damen chanced a self-effacing smile. "You're definitely the first person to have ever accused me of that. But you'll thank me one day when some Veretian beauty catches your eye and you realise this was just a passing fancy by comparison."

Laurent shook his head emphatically as he turned his face away to gather his composure. He wasn't stomping out of the room in a rage, at least, the way he might have done even one or two summers past. Damen took that as a good sign that he was at least old enough to be somewhat mature about this rejection.

"You're not going to tell Auguste about this, are you?" Laurent finally asked.

"Oh, please, not a chance," Damen assured him. "Just imagine if Auguste got it in his head that there was the slightest chance I'd done something to hurt his little brother. He would kill me."

"No," Laurent said. "He'd know better than to let you off so easily. He'd let _me_ deal with you, just as you'd deserve."

Laurent stared him down for a long moment.

"So I suppose it's a good thing you haven't actually done anything wrong, then, isn't it?" Laurent conceded glumly.

I'm sorry, Damen thought, but never got to say, because Laurent was fast on his feet and had disappeared from the room in mere seconds.

When Laurent rode away with his contingent late that afternoon, not to be seen again for the whole year to come, he didn't throw a cool glance back over his shoulder the way Damen had come to expect from their recent goodbyes. 

Damen's chest felt strangely tight.

 

8\. 

It seemed unlikely that there would be any peace talks that year, or perhaps ever again. Not if the Kings of Akielos and Vere had anything to say about it.

"It's one man of theirs weighed against hundreds of our own," King Theomedes growled. "Surely you can see there's no contest. You'll do your duty."

Just a few days before their yearly summit was traditionally scheduled to take place, Damen was instead being raked over the coals for hesitating to go out and try to end a battle by taking the rallying point of the Veretian army out of the equation. 

Because said rallying point was _Auguste_. Damen was actually still having great difficulty believing Auguste was out there killing people at all. The idea of Auguste – whom Damen had once witnessed rescuing a stray cat from a tree and then smiling fondly at it even as it clawed his skin to bleeding – covered in the spilled blood of slain Akielons was so bizarre as to be darkly comical.

Even stranger, bookish little Laurent might also be out there somewhere, getting his first taste of battle, likely well-protected in deference to his age and position, but not necessarily secure enough to save him if Akielos were to finally overwhelm Vere's forces in the wake of their beloved commander's defeat. That prospect was all the more reason for Damen to put his foot down here.

Part of Damen wanted to punch himself soundly in the face for speaking against his father, but he still had to speak his mind. "No. There has to be another way."

His father ranted, but Damen didn't want to hear it; for once in his life, he was far less interested in talking about fighting than he was in discussing peace.

Maybe the traditional dialogue between Akielos and Vere _would_ occur this year after all. If so, Damen dearly hoped that this time it might actually lead to some successful outcome.

 

9\. 

Two summers were, in teenage years, apparently equivalent to a lifetime, Damen thought. He almost didn't recognise Laurent at all. He'd grown so dramatically since last they'd seen each other.

It didn't help that Laurent was also now practically surrounded by admirers, which was about the last thing Damen associated with the boy who had been by turns unwilling to look up from his books and all-too-willing to verbally lash out at anyone within easy striking distance whose name didn't happen to be Auguste. Not that Damen couldn't see why people willingly put up with a few vicious rejoinders to be allowed in Laurent's presence these days, mind. He did have eyes, after all.

Though Damen would never let on as much to anyone. As it was, his father was already massively disappointed in him for placing his friendship with Auguste above the possibility of reclaiming what should rightfully have been Akielon land. The slightest suggestion that Damen might also feel any level of admiration for the other brother as well would be truly courting disaster.

It was impossible to completely avoid Laurent, though, since he seemed determined to force a confrontation.

"My father called you a coward," Laurent informed him, "for calling a parley instead of fighting."

"So did mine," Damen admitted.

"Were you afraid Auguste would defeat you?" Laurent asked, with every air of someone needling at a wound that he was certain had to still deeply hurt. Only he didn't realise that he was poking at entirely the wrong spot.

"No," Damen said. "If I was afraid that day, it wasn't of that." Death was death; it was not to be feared. He'd been altogether more worried that he'd be triumphant. 

He imagined Auguste bleeding out at his feet, his breaths laboured gasps when they should have been laughter. He imagined, with a strangely even larger stab of phantom pain, the look on Laurent's face when he learned his beloved older brother had fallen, and to a man he might just possibly have once considered something of an ally, if not a friend.

"Do you regret not fighting?" Laurent asked.

"No. Not at all," Damen replied.

 

10\. 

Enough time had passed by the next year's peace talks that for every hour of speaking there were at least a few minutes that _weren't_ filled with King Aleron and his chosen courtiers aiming barbed comments at King Theomedes and his advisors about faltering Akielon courage or about how fruitful the harvests in Delfeur had been that year.

All signs pointed towards the Akielon King being unlikely to put up with Veretian smugness for more than about another hour before kicking them back to their own side of the border. That was about when Auguste caught up with Damen away from the prying eyes of their fathers.

"I'm sorry for my father's attitude," Auguste said. "Being here often brings out the worst in him, I think. He would never bring himself to say so, especially within earshot of anyone from Akielos, but in the secrecy of his own mind he knows as well as I do that your call for the battle at Marlas to end was the right one. It would still have been right even if it had lost us Delfeur. Perhaps I am more like him than I am like you, though, for I fear I wouldn't have been equally able to put my kingdom before my pride that day. It was only later that I saw the strength in your actions." 

Damen wanted to point out that Auguste had managed to do far more for his country than Damen had for his that day. He had kept hope alive in his men long past what Akielos had anticipated was possible. Not to mention that ultimately it had been Auguste and his country that walked away with the victory and the land.

"No," Auguste continued, seeing Damen's doubt, "I mean it. You were a far better leader than anyone else on the battlefield that day. And a better man."

Word of the next generation of rulers sharing what might have been interpreted as pacifist words thankfully did not make it back to the current kings. However, they didn't entirely avoid having their discussion overheard. When Damen saw Laurent watching their exchange, he expected Laurent to be looking at Auguste like he had just spoken some kind of blasphemy; the one thing Damen had always known with certainty about Laurent, even when he was barely hip-height and acting contrary just for the sake of being contrary (so, not so very different to how he was now, then) was that he firmly believed his older brother was perfection personified. There could be no better leader or man than Auguste, in Laurent's eyes.

Instead, Laurent was just looking between the two of them pensively.

Damen couldn't get close enough to Laurent to speak with him for the rest of the day, but he spent the last few hours of the talks feeling like not all of the eyes watching him were entirely unfriendly.

 

11\. 

It was Auguste who insisted on holding a tournament once again, despite the fact that the last one had, against all expectations, seemed to act as a portent of real battle.

Damen wasn't stupid. He knew exactly why Auguste insisted on it now, and he was silently thankful.

"Will you watch the festivities?" Damen asked Laurent, abnormally eager for him to show some interest in the proceedings.

He found it impossible to tell if Laurent was just affecting boredom as he drawled, "I prefer to read."

He assumed it was truth at first, as Damen didn't see Laurent in the stands at all when he was preparing for his first bout. The disappointment forming like a hard stone in his gut was both undeniable and inexplicable. 

It wasn't until he peeked out at the ring to check out the progress of the fight directly preceding his own that he burst out laughing.

There was Laurent, whirling his way across the ring as if it were a dance rather than a duel. He was not so solely focused on his books after all, it seemed. Not given the way he handled that sword.

Damen had seen better fighters, of course. Laurent wasn't quite on par with his older brother, for example, and probably never would be. He wasn't sculpted for battle in the same way men like Damen and Auguste were.

But though he may not strictly have the best form, there had nonetheless never been another fighter Damen had enjoyed watching more.

After Laurent had made his opponent yield, he passed by Damen as Damen was on his way to take his place in the ring.

"Did you learn how to fight from one of those books you were talking about?" Damen teased.

"My brother taught me," Laurent said, then paused. "Among others," he added.

Damen grinned, and then proceeded to trounce his opponent in record time. 

He wasn't showing off for any particular audience. Not at all.

After a few bouts where he dominated seemingly against the odds (which Damen watched with ever-increasing eagerness), Laurent faced Auguste in the semi-finals. Contrary to Laurent's years-old complaint, it did not appear Auguste went easy on him that day. He certainly didn't let him win. Laurent actually seemed pleased in the end to have been bested by the superior swordsman. It was a pity, Damen thought, that he and Kastor had never quite achieved between them that kind of unconditional brotherly admiration and affection.

In the match that followed this, as the last two standing in the knock-out draw, Damen and Auguste faced each other with swords. It was just as Auguste had clearly intended from the moment he instigated the tournament. Damen would finally get his chance to show that not only was he not afraid of clashing swords with Crown Prince Auguste of Vere, but that he could in fact more than keep up with him in a fight.

Auguste didn't go easy on him, either, never mind let him win. But unlike Laurent, Damen still managed to pull off a win all the same. Much like Laurent, Auguste was good-natured about it, treating Damen's victory like a joke between friends. Damen, on the other hand, couldn't help but imagine the same outcome in a much more real fight.

Laurent, after Damen helped Auguste to his feet, tipped his chin at Damen in acknowledgement, and perhaps in thanks. His serious expression clearly projected that his thoughts were running parallel with Damen's at that moment.

Damen tried to free himself from his well-wishers long enough to follow the sight of that golden hair tracing throughout the crowd. However, he was kept distracted long enough that the next glimpse Damen was treated to was the sight of Laurent's back as he cantered away north towards Vere the following morning.

 

12\. 

"It's funny," Auguste said. "I've seen that exact same look you're wearing before. Only at the time it was on the face of a jealous eleven-year-old boy with what I thought at the time was a hopeless crush."

"Hmm?" Damen replied, not really listening. Laurent was flitting around the room, making the women of the court who had travelled to be in attendance laugh and flirt with him, and engaging men of power in discussions that looked both serious and productive enough to change the fate of whole kingdoms.

Maybe Laurent should have been handling these treaty talks, Damen thought. The rest of them certainly hadn't had any luck when they'd taken their turns trying to lead the discussions. If stubborn, intelligent Laurent had been given free reign, they'd probably have hammered the details out years ago and wouldn't keep having to drag their retinues here every year for absolutely no real purpose that Damen could divine, because his father and King Aleron didn't even seem to be putting up the appearance of trying to successfully negotiate any more. 

Though the thought of ending these yearly conferences was a peculiarly unhappy one.

When Damen finally broke out of his reverie long enough to mention the possibility of letting Laurent loose on the negotiations to Auguste, he was answered with a full-throated laugh. 

"Damen," Auguste said, "Laurent wrote up an entire treaty that I'm actually pretty sure would cleanly cut through both of our kingdoms' bull-headed demands when he was only nine. He actually tried to show it to you at the beginning of that year's talks, you know, but you were distracted by something your father was saying and didn't even notice he was trying to get your attention. You very nearly made a real enemy of him that day. Of course, by the following week he was back to extolling your virtues and talking about how you'd told him he'd be a fast and cunning swordsman one day, so I suppose you were ultimately forgiven for such a grievous slight."

Damen was dumbstruck. "Did he happen to keep a copy?" he finally asked. 

Auguste shrugged. "I think he decided he'll just properly hash out the details with you one-on-one someday. That is, as soon as our fathers decide they've finally had enough of pretending they're negotiating so they don't have to admit that they just want to get drunk and brag about their conquests to each other."

Damen really and truly considered bashing his head against the hard stone wall, as his father had long ago suggested might be a preferable alternative to the talks.

Damen looked over at Laurent again (all right, his gaze had never actually moved away in the first place, but Damen saw no reason why he should admit to that). He noticed that one of the members of the Akielon court (Damen couldn't remember his name, but he was pretty sure he disliked him for some very valid reason) had his hand resting proprietarily on Laurent's forearm.

"Right," Damen announced, "I think I'd better go discuss those treaty details with Laurent now, then."

If Auguste rolled his eyes, then Damen still hadn't looked away from Laurent long enough to see it.

"Come with me," Damen demanded as soon as he reached Laurent's side, completely ignoring the existence of the man with the wandering hand and the clear and present death wish. 

"Huh, no, I don't think I will," Laurent said dismissively, going back to their detailed discussion of… crop cycles. Really? Just how many books had Laurent read?

"That's fascinating, I'm sure," Damen said impatiently, "but you and I need to discuss a treaty."

He finally looked away from Laurent just long enough to glare at the interloper in a way that he hoped conveyed just how stupid it would be to try to remain.

"Oh, please, go ahead. I'd hate to get in the way of important royal negotiations," the nameless and annoying outsider said hastily. He then made himself seem suddenly much less annoying by practically tripping over himself to disappear into the crowd.

Damen promptly tugged Laurent out of the massive, bustling hall and into a private offshoot where he was fairly certain even the servants and slaves wouldn't happen upon them.

The door was still vibrating on its hinges when Damen crowded Laurent back against the wood and kissed him. He cupped his hand around Laurent's jaw and deepened the kiss as soon as he could be sure Laurent wasn't protesting this treatment.

It was a monumental understatement to say that Laurent wasn't pushing him away.

"Finally," breathed Laurent, clutching at Damen's clothes to keep him from moving away. As if Damen had any intention of that. "It took you long enough, you idiot."

Damen agreed whole-heartedly. It did feel like it had been a long time coming. He could hardly believe that this had nearly never had a chance to happen.

"So is this the beginning of negotiations on that treaty you were talking about, then?" Laurent asked. 

"Absolutely," Damen replied. "The first term up for debate is that I think we're going to have to meet up more than annually from now on. Once a year has been getting us nowhere."

"I wouldn't say 'nowhere'," Laurent argued, brushing his fingertips over his lips.

"So you don't concede to meeting more than once a year is necessary?"

"Certainly not," Laurent scoffed. "After all, 'more than once a year' is such a highly unspecific term. Clearly you learned how to construct binding agreements from your father. I, on the other hand, have actually bothered to read a book or two on the topic."

"Fine. How about if we say we'll meet 'as often as possible' instead? Is that specific enough for you?"

Laurent smiled and leaned into Damen. "Oh, I think I can agree to those terms."

Damen mentally redubbed their treaty negotiations as the far-more-than-annual might-as-well-just-kiss-the-rival-prince-against-a-stone-wall-because-it's-far-more-productive-and-enjoyable talks.

Except that there wasn't really much talking going on at that moment.


End file.
